Leap Day Activities for Kids

Leap day, that extra day added to February 29 every four years, exists for a very important reason: to keep our calendar in sync with Earth’s actual orbit around the Sun.

A year isn’t exactly 365 days long. It takes Earth roughly 365.2422 days to complete one revolution around the sun. That extra 0.2422 days might seem tiny, but over time, it adds up. If we didn’t account for it, our calendar would slowly drift out of sync with the seasons.

But the good news is that extra day gives us something fun to celebrate! Leap Day activities often have to do with frogs, as you’ll see below, but you don’t have to include frog themed things if you don’t want to. Let’s check out some fun Leap Day activities for kids.

The teacher behind Tejeda’s Tots is actually a leap day baby, so reading about what she does in the classroom (post includes links to paid resources) is a lot of fun. Ask your kids what day you think leap day babies should celebrate their birthdays and see if you get different answers.

Mama’s Learning Corner has a printable leap day unit study activity book that works for elementary school kids. It includes information on why we have leap year and how cultures have dealt with time through history. You can download a personal copy free when you sign up for emails, or buy a license for classroom use.

Teach Beside Me also has a little printable book about leap year and why we need that extra day.

Woo Jr. has some printable leap year activities including mazes and a word search, as well as a collection of frog coloring pages, a tracing page and other crafts.

If you want to go all in on frog things, try making a paper plate frog (Our Kid Things), a frog fly catch game (Toucan Box) or try your hand at making origami jumping frogs (Origami Fun).

If it’s warm where you live or you have space for jumping inside, you can have a long jumping contest, play leap frog or hopscotch. Spend some time in math counting to 29 or doing math problems that add up to 29. Do some leap year STEM with Science Schoolyard. And don’t forget to read a leap year book like Leap’s Day or tell some leap year jokes!

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Celebrate Earth Day with Kids

I’m in deep denial about the fact that new year is almost upon us again! It’s been the fastest and the longest year at the same time, and I can look back and see some good things as well as some things I wish had gone differently.

Doing a year in review with your kids — whether in the classroom or at home — is a good way to capture some of their memories and the things they really liked about the year gone by.

There are a lot of different printable year in review worksheets you can use if you want to make this super easy. Here are links to a few (often part of larger posts about NYE celebrations with kids that are worth a read, too):

Teach Beside Me has lots of fun printables fro the end of the year, including a year in review that covers favorite memory, funniest memory and the best book they read, among other topics.
NurtureStore‘s version has space for a self-portrait and prompts like favorite toy, best day out this year and future dream job.
Remember favorites, their “best idea” of the year and have room for setting goals for next year with this one from The Keele Deal.
The year in review from Yes We Made This has room for drawing or writing and includes things like something they learned, a memory they made and a place they visited.

Of course you could pretty easily make your own year in review for the whole family to do that asks questions based on what you most want to remember. (Favorite video game? Best friend? Favorite family memory?)

And if after the year in review you’re ready to look ahead a bit, Mrs. Merry has new year’s resolution printables to inspired kids to look ahead and set goals for things they want to try. You can totally fill this one out as a grownup, too.

[Photo: Mrs. Merry]

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